John W. Henry, Altis, Man Funds Slide in July Commodities Rout

Bloomberg – John W. Henry & Co., the investment firm run by the Boston Red Sox baseball team’s owner, is among hedge funds that suffered their worst drops in almost 18 months in July as oil and other commodities retreated from records.

John W. Henry lost 17 percent on its JWH GlobalAnalytics fund, the firm said on its Web site. Altis Partners Ltd.’s $1 billion global futures program fell 18 percent, paring its gain for the year to 10 percent. London-based Man Group Plc’sAHL Diversified Futures Ltd., the computer program that trades about $25 billion of investments, dropped 5.5 percent through July 28, or a loss of about $1.37 billion in the month.

Oil, natural gas, nickel and corn prices all tumbled in July, making it the worst month for the Reuters/Jefferies CRB Commodity Index in 28 years. The drops pushed commodities trading advisers, which manage about $234 billion, to post their biggest declines since March 2007, according to data compiled by BarclayHedge, a Fairfield, Iowa-based fund-tracker. So-called CTA funds rose 8.3 percent in the first half, making them the best performing strategy in an industry that had its worst start to a year in nearly two decades.